The idle musings of a former military man, former computer geek, medically retired pastor and now full-time writer. Contents guaranteed to offend the politically correct and anal-retentive from time to time. My approach to life is that it should be taken with a large helping of laughter, and sufficient firepower to keep it tamed!

Saturday, January 20, 2018

An "emotional support chicken"???

The day of the service duck and emotional support chicken on airlines may be drawing to a close.

Delta Air Lines Inc. said Friday it will more thoroughly vet passengers’ efforts to fly with all manner of unusual animals, which often board U.S. airlines under the guise of psychological or medical support.

“Customers have attempted to fly with comfort turkeys, gliding possums known as sugar gliders, snakes, spiders and more,” the airline said Friday in a news release. “Ignoring the true intent of existing rules governing the transport of service and support animals can be a disservice to customers who have real and documented needs.”

The Emotional Support Animal situation on airplanes has been getting discussed on a lot of flier discussion forums for several years (and is relatively new, as compared with Service Animals, which are different -- service animals require special training and assist for specific disabilities, whereas ESAs provide emotional support, do not require training, and need a mental health professional note saying that this is an ESA).

For example, there's this thread discussing the issue, which was started back in 2015:

Unfortunately, it's remarkably easy to get certification. Try a search for "ESA papers", and your top results are likely to be companies that will provide you with such a letter (after a "phone interview" with one of their professionals), for under $200 (the site that was a the top of my search results just now is offering travel letters on sale for $130).

Note that if you're allergic, for example, to an ESA, then the ESA gets priority, and you get moved.

And the airlines don't have much choice -- although Delta has started to try to minimize the issue of ESA problems. It's all controlled by Federal law (the Air Carrier Access Act -- ACAA), and the DOT regulations interpreting that law.

My emotional support chicken usually comes from Hometown Buffet, unless I'm near the drive-through for Chick-Fil-A.

And all these @$$holes trying to bootstrap their pet into "service animal" status are finally liable to get Congress to declare the sham a sham, and getting a certification will be harder than getting a building permit in Manhattan. As it should be.

I had one of my dogs legally certified as a "support animal" just as a goof. I don't take him anywhere or anything it was just sort of an inside joke among our family. Why do it? Just because I could and for the lolz. The same reason I became a Notary Public. Simply for the lolz. The whole ESA thing is a scam. Now if you want to allow all and sundry animals onto your airliner or into your place of business I'm all for it. If you want a cigar smoking monkey to hang out in your barbershop (an actual thing locally in the 40s I'm told) then as the owner of said business you have the God given right to do so. Likewise you have the same God given right to toss out people with cigar smoking monkeys or support alpacas.

It also isn't fun for the maintenance people having to clean up the mess and repair the damage done to the interior of an airplane after someones "ESA" went apecrap and started chewing/clawing, barfing, pissing on the monuments(The interior walls) of an airplane and trying to get it ready for another flight or repairing the damage at an overnight layover. I am glad that company and others are trying to corral in the people that use the "ESA" to keep from putting their dog/cat/rat/bird/donkey/horse/sheep/pig, or what have you in the cargo bin in a carrier.

Being the kind of of guy that I am, I registered one of my longhorns as a ESA. Most amusing $45 I have spent in quite a while, as the application was approved without comment. I have not, though, tried to take a 1,200 pound steer on an airline (yet). That cracked me up so much that I, using a picture of a baby orangutan instead of a picture of my red-headed wife, registered said red-head as a "primate" ESA so I can take her everywhere!